


Golden Memories

by maybe_maye



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gen, Martha is a very good friend, Romance, its canon that the how long are you gonna stay with me scene was actually woman wept shhh, this is painfully cliche and fluffy sorry not sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:41:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25909027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maybe_maye/pseuds/maybe_maye
Summary: The Doctor takes Martha to a planet where a special festival lets people project their memories and promotes expressing your true feelings.
Relationships: Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler, The Doctor (Doctor Who)/Rose Tyler
Comments: 7
Kudos: 62





	Golden Memories

“Rose would have loved these.” The Doctor muttered to himself, peering at the trinket cupped in his hand. Martha clenched her teeth and tried valiantly not to scream in frustration. 

Another day, another planet, and yet _another_ mention of the infamous Rose. Martha supposed she ought to be grateful the Doctor had said Rose _would_ have loved them because that implied she hadn’t seen them before so this couldn’t be yet another planet he was revisiting and forcing Martha to third wheel through memory. 

“How much for it?” The Doctor's inquiry broke through her musings as he strolled over to the alien working the register, or whatever passed for a register on this planet. Martha side eyed him as he purchased and pocketed the little trinket. He had been doing that a lot lately and she was more than a little worried one of these days she was gonna stumble on a shrine lurking somewhere in the TARDIS. 

But then he flashed her that devastating smile and wiggled his fingers and she took his hand and Martha couldn’t help but think that maybe he bought it for her. After all, what kinda bloke, alien or not, holds hands with a girl and looks at her like that if he doesn’t harbor some sort of feelings for her? He might be a little bit hung up on his ex but she’d only been traveling with him for a few months now. Maybe he just needed a little more time before he was ready to move on. 

With that surge of confidence, she tightened her grip on his hand and nestled a bit more into his side. 

“Now Martha Jones!” The Doctor exclaimed, looking down at her with an easy grin. “Where to next?”

\---

“Now these aren’t just any old flowers.” The Doctor was rambling as they walked arm in arm up the hillside. “They’ve got special properties. The pollen in them causes visions, not quite hallucinations but it allows the mind, even those of non-telepathic races, to project images of their memories. They only bloom once a year and the festival is the best party this side of the Xerxus galaxy.” 

The sky was a dark lilac, the dual silver moons shining brightly down over the silver and gold meadow. The forest that ringed the village was a dark blue and green, lush trees framed against the light sky and she had never seen so many stars. Martha thought it looked rather like a fairy tale, like something out of a book for children with fairy rings and pots of gold at the end of the rainbow. The natives were tall and lithe humanoids with skin in shades of dusty pink, dark brown, and pale purple with translucent antennae-like protrusions on their heads. They gathered in the meadow with bobbing lights that floated around them, casting warm pink and yellow shadows. 

“The natives wait all year for this weekend. Mind you, one year for them is about 6 and a quarter Earth years. They sing songs, burn tributes, and drink special elixirs made from the nectar of the fruit that the flowers grow into. That helps them reach the mental state needed in order to best project their memories, to show each other anything from missing loved ones, daydreams, painful pasts.” The Doctor quieted, his eyes dark and distant as he trailed off. "Express how how they really feel."

“So it’s kinda like burning man?”

“In what world are magical flowers with the power to project the images on your mind like 21st century _burning man_?” The Doctor gaped at her, his melancholy momentarily banished and Martha laughed.

“Well I don’t know! Bunch of people getting plastered, expressing themselves and you did say they burn tributes! Is Woodstock a better term?”

“Bring a human to a deeply sacred ritual and they compare it to a music festival. Bloody humans.” The Doctor sighed but he nudged Martha good-naturedly and procured two bottles from inside his jacket. “I picked some up while we were in town. Better drink it fast if you want to have the best results.” He uncorked his and began to take a long drink. 

Martha's eyes lingered on the pale expanse of his throat and she felt the stirrings of excitement and worry. Would he get drunk? What would they do together? What did he want to show her so badly that he brought her to this festival?

“I’m not gonna get wasted am I?” She eyed the golden contents of her bottle dubiously.

“Nah, just a little more free spirited. We don’t have their physiology. It won’t affect us as much but we can still interact with the pollen.” He sobered again and looked up at the sky.

“It can be a very personal experience, I don’t know what exactly it will show either of us but I -” He swallowed and looked at Martha with those painfully sad, dark eyes again. “I didn’t want to be alone.” 

She took his hand again and squeezed it tightly, a show of silent support as they reached the outer fringes of the gathering crowd. It warmed her heart to know he trusted her with this and wanted to share this moment with her. Taking a drink from her own bottle, she was surprised by the pleasant taste. 

“Oh that’s lovely!” 

He gave her a small smile and they made their way to one of the logs and stumps that ringed the large clearing. The spaces between each were easily 10 to 20 feet, giving some semblance of privacy to each party. The trees above were laden with the golden flowers, a few motes of pollen already beginning to fall lazily to the ground. 

They finished their drinks and sat in silence for a few moments, waiting for it to begin

Then with a gasp from the crowd, the moons finally aligned in the sky and filled the clearing with a silver light. The blossoms on the trees opened fully and Martha felt tears prick her eyes at the sight. 

A faint, shimmering light emitted from each blossom and they moved in the breeze, golden dust swirling up and out of the petals and coming together into impossible designs. 

She was reminded of snowflakes and how they’re never the same, watching the tendrils of gold dust come apart and together in the wind, slowly swirling down to the clearing. 

She looked down as the Doctor dropped her hand, watched as he stood and greeted the dust with a solemn face, his eyes dark as they reflected the dancing motes around his hands. 

Martha stayed seated, inching back as a stream of light suddenly whipped past her, spiraling above before coming to stop in front of her. She looked around for guidance and saw the others breathing it in, stepping into it, or even in one case licking the air. She wrinkled her nose at the idea and steeled herself before raising her hands to waft some into her face. 

Blinking furiously, she was reminded of the pixie dust in Peter Pan and she sneezed but felt warm and safe and there was a glowing feeling in her heart and mind that calmed her, made everyone else but the Doctor fade away into obscurity. 

Suddenly there was a presence in her mind, faint and nurturing and she gasped at the vision in front of her. The dust had reformed and it was her mum, smiling down at her and she realized she had been thinking of home. She loved traveling with the Doctor but she missed her family and more golden particles swirled around her and she saw her father come up behind her mother, resting a hand on her shoulder. They looked so young and happy. They were mostly golden but faint colors and details glimmered through the particles, like a faded photo or some sort of hologram. She could make out the red of her father's sweater and the brown of her mother's hair and the longer she looked the clearer they seemed. 

Martha blinked back tears, the memory bittersweet. She stood up properly now, wanting to get closer to inspect them. They didn’t watch her, still looking to where she had been before. 

“Oh Martha, look.” Her mother's voice was distant and she held out a bundle and Martha realized this was the day they had brought her brother home from the hospital. One of the last times she remembered their family being whole. 

“We named him Leo.” Her father's voice whispered and she watched as Trish bounded up to peer into the swaddle of blankets. 

She turned to see what else was going on in the clearing and out of the corner of her eye watched as her family dissolved into swirling golden and silver dust once more. 

It spun around her, making her dizzy and she laughed and her heart felt lighter than it had in ages. 

“Oh Martha Jones, you are a star.” The Doctor's voice warmed her even more, echoing in her head and she watched as the dust formed the TARDIS and her Doctor, reaching a hand out to her. He beamed at her and his form flickered through their best moments together, him kissing her, giving her a key, calling her brilliant, amazing, one of a kind. 

There were so many moments she held close to her heart, that she wanted to relieve and share with him, see if he saw them this way too. 

She was giddy with it, seeing these moments again and feeling certain they meant something. That her mind, her heart, had deemed them the moments most worth reliving. She looked for the real Doctor, hoping he would see and realize how she felt. And maybe he was seeing her too. 

Martha pushed past her vision of the Doctor and there was the real one, reaching out a hand to touch the golden dust vision of his own making. She stopped short, her stomach dropping despite the pleasant, calming effects of the drink and dust.

Tears were tracking down his face and she heard him mutter to himself, in a tone she had never heard before.

“Still just an image, no touch.” His voice broke on the last word and he huffed a painful laugh and she finally got a good look at what his mind had projected. 

A young woman smiled at him with a mouth that was a little too wide, her tongue caught between her teeth. The vision was clearer than Martha’s, almost lifelike besides the golden and blurry edges. 

The girl’s hair was bottle blonde, her eye makeup was heavy and her outfit was terribly 2000’s and pink and she giggled at some unheard comment, her eyes dancing as she replied with half a conversation. 

This must be Rose. 

“Oh you think you’re _so_ impressive.” 

The vision shifted and now Rose was being swung around in a hug by the Doctor, feet off the floor and a pink skirt swirling behind her. The image got clearer, the Doctor projecting himself now too and she could hear a northern accent telling someone to run as more images of Rose flickered past. 

Martha was struck by a realization. Rose wasn’t as perfect as she thought she would be. She wasn’t particularly tall or thin or beautiful. She was just some ordinary girl, with a bit of a rough accent and messy hair. She even seemed to be from Martha’s time. 

But she was beautiful, in the way she looked at the Doctor and how alive she seemed, how full of joy. She was light. 

A different man danced with her, some older man with big ears and a leather jacket. There was that man's voice again, that deep northern accent twisting the words.

“Rose Tyler you’re a genius!” He swung her around again and her image shimmered and she stood before them in some old fashioned gown. “You look beautiful.”

Martha wondered if somehow this other man was the Doctor, although how he could be she didn’t know. All of time and space though, there wasn’t much she wouldn’t believe these days.

“I could save the world but lose you.” The Doctor's smile twisted and Martha realized the bitter irony in that he had lost her. She had always thought Rose left, he had said she was with his family, but looking at these memories, she couldn’t imagine Rose leaving him by choice.

The Doctor stiffened and the images faltered. 

“Will I ever see you again?” A crying Rose choked out, hair blown across tear streaked cheeks before quickly disappearing and changing into a calm Rose, bundled into a jacket holding hands with the Doctor. 

“How long are - “. 

The memory winked out of existence, replaced by flickering images, almost too fast for Martha to keep up with. 

Rose with pigtails and a scarf, Rose winking in a TARDIS blue bikini, Rose kissing the top of a spacesuit helmet, Rose in pjs with messy hair, Rose-

“How long - “ 

The image shifted again, bringing back the crying Rose. An image of Martha’s doctor, his suit brown instead of blue stood before her stiffly, face solemn.

“You can’t.” 

The image shifted again and again, the dust flying around them madly, almost worryingly fast, whipping up a breeze that pushed against Martha and the real Doctor. 

“Forev-”

“But I love you.” Rose choked out, hands flying up to cover her face. 

The golden light calmed down and once again it was the Rose in the parka, holding hands with the Doctor. Around the memory and the two in the present the dust settled into large waves, frozen high above them and Martha could swear she smelled the cold, clean scent of ice. The forest around them faded away in the presence of the strength of the Doctors most treasured memory. 

Martha had never seen the Doctor smile like that, like the one in the memory. Carefree and easy and… in love. 

“How long are you going to stay with me?” The Doctor asked, the sentence finally complete. 

“Forever.” Rose replied with a small, secretive smile. 

Martha silently walked up to the real Doctor and slid her hand into his. He startled and stared down at her. She ignored the feeling of her heart breaking in two and cleared her throat.

“Right then.” Martha nodded at the visions swirling around them, golden light playing off their faces as the waves crashed down back into dust and the clearing began to reappear. She looked at the Doctor, her Doctor, this daft alien who she loved. “Tell me about her.” 

He smiled at her, not the smile he gave Rose but a smile that tugged at her heart nonetheless and she saw the gratitude in his eyes, squeezing her hand in his. 

“Her name was Rose.” 

**Author's Note:**

> This is like embarrassingly tender and cliche and dramatic. But I couldn't help myself (although I wrote this a while back). I love Martha but I also love when the Doctor just can't shut up about Rose. Martha is a great friend and deserved better. So in this little AU she realized more about their relationship earlier on, the Doctor was more transparent, and they were able to be best friends and have fun and Martha didn't get stuck in the past several times because OH boy did she get the short end of the stick.


End file.
